


Metamorphosis

by bexacaust



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, Torture, Trauma, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 04:25:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2837867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bexacaust/pseuds/bexacaust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And given the chance, he would play Deliverer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Metamorphosis

**Author's Note:**

> Ooey and gooey and violent Amporas; like true seadwellers should be.

_I never meant for you to fix yourself…_

 

You weren’t going to be saved; you know that now. Your wrists burned like fire, and it was getting hard to think. Your stomach clenched angrily, and you winced…

It has been exactly one week since you had been caught with a thick net laced with sly wire and resin-ropes. You’d been hauled aboard, and beaten back into submission. He had frowned at you.

"Why don’t ye fight?"

You’d been too scared to answer him, breathing heavily and confused.

He had tilted his head, and freed you without question, beckoning for you to follow him. He questioned you, gave you heady spirits and wormed information from you.

"I can fix what they’ve done to you, Cronus."

You had blinked wearily at him.

"I can fix you."

You nodded.

Now you were here, and the door opened to show too bright light and the tall devil who’d taken you from your diving spot. You tensed, knowing what would come next. He goads you, prods you, demands you fight. He digs his claws and his words in and it hurts, Lord Above it HURTS so much. All you want is to go back.

This time, your gills tear and you howl in manic pain, swiping out with your claws and catch his cheek. He laughs at you, knocks you stumbling back and you collapse heavily.

The door shuts, and you scream.

-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Your gills are infected; badly. You call out for help, and get no answer but a thud against the door and a different voice yelling for you to be quiet each time. You cry, you snarl, you howl in pain.

You chew one of your dulled claws to a point, and use it to lancet swollen flesh. You gag when you feel the give in your skin, and the scent of disease hits your nostril and you stumble to a corner to be sick.

It’s been at least two weeks now. He still visits, beating you into some kind of headspace you’re not sure you should be in. Its getting harder and harder to control your natural instinct to fight, to kills, to taste blood.

He tears into you with harsh claws and the infection clouds your mind.

He leaves you alone again; hair that was once healthy and dark now wavy and wispy and dirty. Your shirt is history, torn into strips to use as bandages that dirtied in minutes. Your jeans have become stained, your boots scuffed and dull.

The infection worsens.

He visits in the early morning, his lackey of the day tossing something to you; food it looks like. Some kindof hardtack, it smells like honey and you wolf it down with the kind of desperation only the starving will managed.

You see his hand in the corner of your blurry vision, reaching to take it from you.

You act without thinking, snarling viciously and snapping your double-rows of teeth down onto his hand and making him swear. You tear sideways, ripping a lim chunk of flesh from his hand and watching violet bubble out of the wound as his hand retreats.

The call of protein is too much to bear; you snap your jaws and swallow without a second thought.

He was smiling as he left.

You’re sick later.

Soon, its been a month; your infection spreads to your other rib-gills, and you hack syrupy purple. You think you’re dying. Death does not scare you anymore, now you are angry.

You are dying alone.

You are wounded and have given up hope for the second time in your life.

You feel your rage clouding your judgement, and you welcome the cold blackness that hatred brings you. It is comforting, and cool; you recognize the taste of it from all the times you swallowed it down with what they would say.

You scoff to yourself, feeling your dorsal fin twitch and begin to rise.

They probably didn’t even miss you, or notice you were gone.

These thoughts plague you.

Another month passes, abuse and torture highlighting your days and you spiral down, down into all of those taboo thoughts and feelings Beforus tried to repress.

The door opened and shut, and your head jerks up, spines clacking lightly in a threat display rattle. You glance to the side.

Another lackey.

Your stomach rumbles.

"Oi, boyo, Cap’n says its ti-EEEEARGH!"

He screams, for a while. The burn of rage is cleansing your bloodstream, and the taste and feel of blood on lips and claws is a long-denied relief. You’re losing the battle to nature….

You’ve lost.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Dualscar heard a shriek echo in the halls when he turned his back, and with a smile, he waited. The footsteps were unsteady, the growl bubbled from the harsh breathing and infection.

The privateer face his unwilling charge.

Grey skin bruised and soured, gills ragged and oozing. His face was ruddied by fading violet, his teeth and claws were bared. He was ready to attack, and then-

Dualscar offered a small bite of his meal to the rabid and broken seadweller before him. Bites taken tentatively, and with soft whines of delight.

Dualscar waited until Cronus groaned from overeating and illness to scoop him into his arms. The boy was draped, half-gone from the sudden influx of nutrients, hanging from the captain’s arms like a broken sacrificial Messiah to the ego of the Orphaner.

Dualscar smiled once Cronus was stripped and cleaned and redressed, bandaged and medicated.

"I’ll fix ye right up, li’l ‘un."

Cronus awoke after a week and a half in a high temper; breaking the nose of two medics and having to be physically removed from the First Mate’s throat. He was broken, berserk, and hateful; having stewed in dark emotion and hopelessness for two months on this ship.

Then Dualscar visited him.

Cronus snarled, but did not move. 

Dualscar’s smile was manic and nearly permanent now. He sat upon the bed, and arched his eyebrows.

"Where’re those li’l friend yah told me about?"

"Hell if I knowv."

"I’dve expected ta see ‘em, given they’re your fr-"

"They ain’t, you old bastard now fuckin’ speak your piece."

"Oh?"

Cronus’ hand wer ecurlinginto fists until the knuckles went white.

"I vwas just a gag for them; a joke, a fuckin’ PUNCHLINE… They left me here ta rot; ta fuckin’ SUFFER…"

Dualscar nodded, “Now, tha’s true. Not liek you can do much about it.”

"Says who."

A tone like a lava flow and a scowl to match. Dualscar chuckled.

"Your precious Beforus’ teachin’ forbid it, don’t they?"

"We ain’t on Beforus anymore.", was Cronus’s murmur.

Dualscar nodded, “You’ve got another month wi’ me, an’ then I’ll put yeh ta shore.”

Cronus looked at him, “An’ vwhy should I fuckin’ trust YOU?”

Dualscar laughed then, a cold sound like steel chipping ice, “Because I’m th’ only one who can teach ya how ta make them suffer like you did.”

Cronus paused, and for a second Dualscar thought all his hard work would go to waste. But Cronus smiled, and nodded.

"Yessir."

"Tha’s my boy. We start in two days."

Dualscar couldn’t be happier as he left the room.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

The privateer was almost upset at how quickly time passed; he had grown used to watching his new protege wipe the floor with his crew members. Cronus was broad and dense, filled with sweeps of repressed hatred and anger, and watching him channel it was beautiful.

He was clothed again, and he took comfort in it. The clothes were his, stolen in a quick night raid done while he was still under lock and key. He let his hair fall wild, pushing it back when he needed to and letting it wave and curl like it was meant to.

Dualscar smiled when he saw a crowd on the beach. He clapped a hand on Cronus’s strong shoulder, and squeezed.

"Remember your lesson, boyo."

"Yes Captain."

The skiff was dropped, and Cronus followed the two crewmates who were his escort to shore. Dualscar laughed when he saw the panic in the small crowd of young trolls the second Cronus’ boots hit sand, laughed aloud when he saw them scatter; all except for the Serket girl.

Dualscar was exceptionally pleased.


End file.
